


strange birds

by Cinnamonbookworm



Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: F/M, Female Friendship, Friendship, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Season/Series 04 Spoilers, in canon for now, possible canon divergence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-15
Updated: 2015-08-15
Packaged: 2018-04-14 19:14:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,972
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4576488
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cinnamonbookworm/pseuds/Cinnamonbookworm
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>Somewhere along the line, they became friends, and sometime after that, it became home.</i><br/>Or: a not-so-detailed kind of poetic description of how Laurel and Felicity became friends.</p>
            </blockquote>





	strange birds

**Author's Note:**

> so bottom line yesterday on tumblr i got a few nasty asks about how laurel and felicity can't be friends, which prompted me to not only post my favorite laurel and felicity stuff i've written but also to write this. spoilers for the newly released pictures of the new lair.  
> also: every song on birdy's album fire within is a laulicity song and i will fight you on this

It starts, as most things do, with Oliver Queen and a lie.

And it’s a harmless one, really, said in the rush of all things coming together.

_“This is Felicity; she’s setting up my internet.”_

And Laurel, she wants oh-so-badly to believe it’s the truth, but knows that it’s more than likely not, because this _Felicity_ is quite pretty and _Oliver’s not blind_ and she knows where that lethal combination leads.

 _Gorgeous Laurel_ sticks in her head for a while after that, though, because whoever, whatever, Felicity is to Oliver, they’ve talked enough for her to know that yes, Laurel is _the_ Laurel, _the Gorgeous Laurel_. Maybe that’s why it’s not so hard to believe it when Tommy tells her Oliver is still in love with her. Maybe that’s why it’s so easy to get swept up in her emotions and relax into the dreamy haze of the romanticization she’d done of a romance that never really worked. Maybe the words of a stranger were all that she needed to have the guts to make a mistake.

Maybe Laurel wanted to make a mistake. Maybe she didn’t. Maybe it depends on what day it is that she’s looking back on said mistake. Because it is a mistake, and she realizes it as she looks down into the quickly-fading smile of the love she’d never really fully accepted as love until she lost it. So maybe _gorgeous Laurel_ means nothing, but maybe it means everything.

 

So Laurel’s prettier than she’d expected.

But really, pictures don’t do this woman justice. All dark hair and long legs with honest wide eyes and high cheekbones. It’s not hard to see why this is the woman that Oliver has been in love with for the past year, maybe longer, judging by the way he always swoops in to save her.

And Laurel’s asking who she is.

“Nobody,” Felicity says, because she knows Laurel’s question is an accusatory one, and god forbid she ever mess things up for Oliver. She’s not an idiot; she knows his reputation, and he has occasionally lived up to it - not for _her_ of course, but his rotating door of girlfriends and ex-girlfriends seems to keep him busy enough not to think about Laurel too often. But she doesn’t want to be seen as them, no matter what flimsy excuse Oliver is about to use for her being there. Because she’s _not_ _nobody_ , even to the great and mighty Laurel Lance. “I mean, I’m not nobody. I’m someone, obviously. And so are you…”

 _Gorgeous Laurel._ She doesn’t know why she says it, maybe as one last broken attempt to regain Laurel’s high opinion of Oliver. Maybe because she knows her little crush on him is ridiculous and Laurel makes him happy. Maybe because when Tommy Merlyn showed up in Verdant and told Felicity all about his problems because he didn’t realize she was the girl who ran tech in the basement downstairs for his hooded friend, he talked about Laurel like she was the sunrise that would get him out of bed every morning.

_She’s setting up my internet._

Yeah, like Laurel’s not going to see right through that one, Oliver. But Laurel lets them go anyways.

They don’t talk for a while after that.

 

Felicity Smoak was definitely not there to set up Oliver’s internet. Because as soon as he comes back into town, the tabloids are covered in one and only one subject: the promotion of Felicity Smoak to Oliver Queen’s Executive Assistant and their secret and torrid office affair.

And it might be a rumor but it might not be. And Laurel honestly doesn’t give a shit. Well, she’s trying not to give a shit. Trying to ignore the guilt that sets in the pit of her stomach like a knot whenever she thinks about the events that led up to the night of the quake.

She has bigger problems. Like the vigilante. Who she’s blaming for Tommy’s death - has to blame for it - so the guilt doesn’t swallow her up and eat her alive.

But it’s hard to focus on said bigger problems when she’s talking to Oliver at a party and things seem to be going in a direction that looks like hope when Felicity Smoak comes up and pulls him away, “borrows” him, if you will, and she can’t help but give her a once-over. Because they’re opposite sides of the same coin, in little black dresses and high high heels.

But, statistically speaking, Laurel should be more his type. _Everyone_ knows Oliver Queen likes leggy brunettes.

“Excuse us,” Oliver says.

So what intrigues him so much about the shorter, blonder, Felicity?

Or maybe the real question is what intrigues _her_ so much?

 

Felicity knows she can’t be mad at Laurel about the comment. Because, really, the comment isn’t that insulting in itself; she’s heard so much worse. But it’s the way she says it, leaning on his chest with this sense of closeness that Oliver would usually pry himself away from but can’t bring himself to now.

“I could come be _your_ secretary.”

Maybe it’s the hand on his shoulder that’s bugging her. Maybe it’s their proximity and the way Laurel is lifting one heel up, popping it like in Princess Diaries, and somehow still looking classy and sophisticated even while she’s probably too drunk to be able to remember this in the morning.

Or maybe it’s just the bitter tone of the words ringing in her head from months ago. How he doesn’t think he can be with someone he could really care about. And she’s not sure which part makes her angry, the part where it only applies to her or the part where it means he doesn’t care about Laurel enough to be worried.

“Hi, Laurel. How are you?”

And somehow she still manages to summon up enough empathy to cover the jealousy. And maybe she knows she’ll never compare to Laurel Lance but she slides her hand up Oliver’s arm when he walks over to her anyways because she needs some assurance that he’s still here. That he’s not going to leave.

 

And then it turns into something more. First they’re not quite friends, but favor friends, and then Felicity’s knocking on the door of her office and they’re talking and Laurel is realizing why Oliver’s in love with this woman and Felicity is realizing what everyone loves so much about Laurel.

And there’s a moment in the week after Oliver comes back from the dead when Felicity opens up to her. And they talk about the subject they’ve been treading tenderly around ever since they landed on some level of civility towards each other.

And they both know the way _I love you_ from his mouth can be quite possibly the worst sound you’ve ever heard. And Laurel learns how “I don’t want to be a woman that you love” can feel like a punch in the gut to both parties and how walls are sometimes necessary to keep yourself from getting hurt, even when you’re the epitome of empathy.

And Felicity learns about growth and change and the way he looks at her and the good and the bad and all the things that Laurel knows caused them to fall apart again. And somewhere on the line they end up so wrapped up in the emotions of each other that they become friends.

So when Oliver calls her an addict, Laurel isn’t afraid to pull the Felicity card on him.

And maybe the way his defense crumbles like paper under the blade of her words is a good thing, because at least he actually cares about her. Maybe the mere idea that Laurel knows enough about that situation unnerves him. Maybe it’s a painful reminder for the both of them that things didn’t work out and that things can never go back to the way they were and that Felicity is his last chance.

And she may be his last chance but for Laurel, this beam of sunshine is her salvation in a hailstorm of criticism.

Felicity doesn’t realize how much she’s been craving a female friend until Laurel comes into her life. And Roy and Dig are wonderful and amazing, but they don’t know the way Oliver Queen’s voice sounds when he says he loves you. They don’t know how to stay sane when you’re trying to hold on for dear life, lest you be swept away by your emotions.

Laurel’s the only one who doesn’t comment on Ray Palmer.

And when she catches the bouquet at Dig and Lyla’s wedding, Laurel is the one who helps her spruce it up and put it in a lair, simultaneously a symbol for the future Oliver lost with Laurel and the future he is letting slip through his fingers with Felicity. Laurel’s the one with cupcakes and coffee dates and the one who knows just how therapeutic retail shopping can be.

And maybe when Felicity comes home from Nanda Parbat the first time the first person she goes to is Laurel because Laurel understands. Laurel understands what it’s like to have him and then lose him and feel like it’s all your fault.

And maybe their voices in each other’s ears are what keeps them from falling apart completely. Even when Laurel’s father won’t talk to her and Felicity has to watch Oliver be someone she can’t even recognize. Because something was born in the cold winter of despair, and its flames have not diminished as the days grow warmer and longer.

 

“I want to be with you,” he says and they go off together and Felicity does not miss the secret smile Laurel shares with her as they leave, or the texts and presents and the care packages that somehow find them no matter where in the country they are.

She does miss her new friend, though.

And there’s one night in particular, after their first fight, when she seeks her friend’s counsel.

“You already did the best thing you could do," Laurel whispers to her, soothingly, over the phone, “I never called him out and it just made things worse. Besides, he loves you too much to leave you over towels.”

And suddenly it all sounds ridiculous. And Felicity feels a thousand times better, so when she comes back into the hotel room and Oliver is sitting there all closed off, it’s not hard for her to come up behind him and wrap her arms around him and kiss him and laugh and tell him that they’re better for this. Their conflict, if nothing else, has made their relationship stronger.

Somehow Laurel’s words always have a way of sounding like nothing but pure, adulterated prophecy. Maybe it’s because she’s a lawyer.

And when they come back, and Laurel asks “How was the honeymoon?” and Felicity feels the need to ramble on about how it wasn’t actually a honeymoon because he married Nyssa and not her but that’s all okay now because somehow they got the divorce papers signed, it’s not hard to feel like the animosity between Oliver and Laurel has disappeared.

They still fight, occasionally, and Felicity more than often takes Laurel’s side. And, one night, when they’re all circled around the big conference table in the new lair, and Laurel is on her left and Oliver is on her right and Dig is on _his_ right and Thea and Sara are across from them, boots propped up on the table and swapping Chinese food cartons, and Ray’s over helping Lyla with Sara and Nyssa is arguing with Laurel about the reliability of fortune cookies, Felicity can’t help but feel like this is it, this is home.

And somehow it was born out of a lie and Oliver Queen. But now it is so much more than that.

 

 


End file.
